hi all. I just wanted to share this beautiful little 1912 Gibson F-2 blacktop Mandolin I was able to obtain (indirectly) from a professional musician's private collection. He's owned this Mandolin for several years (he's a fiddle player) but didn't play it much. He purchased it directly from another musician's private collection in Nashville, TN. It's been sitting in storage all these years and I was told he only let it go because he wanted it back out into the public being played. I took the gig.
I recently had the Gruhn Guitars appraisal team take a virtual look at it and Joe Spann (the man) told me all I needed to know. The FON# dates it to July of 1912 and the serial # indicates it was shipped out from the factory March of 1913. It was also the appraisal team's general consensus that the Mandolin was sent back to the Gibson factory just prior to WWII for an upper bout crack repair by the scroll that you can barely see & a top overspray. This being my first vintage Gibson, I can tell you it rings like a bell and smells like an old comic book which makes me one proud new Gibson-ite!
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